


Meet Me at the Fair

by shadowen



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Crush, F/M, Fluff, Get Together, Pining, Sam Wilson Is a Good Bro, marvel poc exchange, roadtrip adventures, unapologetic musical reference
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-28
Updated: 2014-07-28
Packaged: 2018-02-10 20:06:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2038344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowen/pseuds/shadowen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam is man enough to admit that he's a little intimidated.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Meet Me at the Fair

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> _Meet me in St. Louis, Louis, meet me at the fair,_  
>  _Don't tell me the lights are shining any place but there;_  
>  _I'll be waiting at the station, for the whole darned congregation,_  
>  _Meet me in St. Louis, Louis, meet me at the fair_  
>  -"Meet me in St. Louis, Louis", Sterling & Mills (1904)

Sam is man enough to admit that he’s a little intimidated. He’s not easily intimidated, in general, but he ends up shaking in his boots at just the thought of Agent Romanov. 

Not Natasha. He hasn’t earned the right to call her Natasha, and that says something right there that he knows he needs to _earn_ it. It says something else entirely that he _wants_ to.

She meets up with them in St Louis, and she laughs when Sam and Steve break into song on the sidewalk. She could be faking, but there’s a tiny dimple on the side of her chin that shows up whenever Steve tells a joke, so Sam thinks that’s a good sign. The next day she’s gone, and Sam finds a note in his jacket pocket that says, “ _Don’t tell me the lights are shining any place but there._ ”

“Man, she’s something,” he says.

Steve just shakes his head and claps Sam on the shoulder, grinning like he just heard a new joke.

They don’t see her again until Mexico City. The past few months have been relentless, one disappointing lead after another in a series of unfamiliar cities and seedy motels. Now they’ve hit a dead end, and Steve is driving him crazy, so Sam calls literally the only person he actually knows in Steve’s contacts list. 

She’s there before daybreak, and Sam wakes up to find her sitting on Steve’s otherwise empty bed, watching him.

“Morning, soldier.”

Sam snorts. “So you know, that’s just a little creepy.”

She smiles, and that little dimple appears. It’s still kind of creepy, but Sam’s getting used to this particular brand of creepy. “How’s he doing?” she asks, suddenly sincere.

Sam sighs. “Pretending to be better than he is, like it’s not wearing him down.” He nods at the smooth pillow and the barely rumpled sheets. “Like all the sleep he’s losing ain’t nothing. I don’t care what kinda super-charged metabolism he’s running on. Man’s got to get some shut-eye.”

Romanov hums thoughtfully. Her expression isn’t much different from normal, but Sam gets the feeling that she’s studying him, like maybe he’s being evaluated as much as Steve. What she’s evaluating or why, Sam has no idea, but he feels suddenly like it’s junior year of high school and he’s trying to impress Tamika Harley all over again.

When Steve returns with two large paper cups of coffee, he looks between the two of them, and, just for a moment, he sags under the weight of all the burdens he’s carrying. Then he squares his shoulders and asks, “Is this an intervention?”

“Just a conversation,” Romanov replies. She glances briefly at Sam, and he stands, stretching.

“Think I’m gonna go enjoy some sunshine with my coffee.” He snags one of the cups on his way out the door and ignores Steve’s frown of betrayal.

Whatever Romanov says seems to work. When he finds Sam a little while later, lounging on top of a low stone wall in the shade, Steve looks more like himself and less like a man on the trail of a lost cause.

"We good?" Sam asks, and Steve nods.

"We're good." Steve gives him a half smile. "And, you know, thanks. For calling Nat."

Sam shrugs, but he allows himself a mental high-five. "That's what I'm here for, man."

Steve's smile spreads into an honest grin. "Uh huh. Because you're so useless at everything else."

Later, Sam gets a text from a number he doesn't know. " _I'll be waiting at the station for the whole darned congregation_." 

He might be man enough to admit that there’s a butterfly or two fluttering happily around his stomach, but he sure as hell won't admit it out loud.

The next time he sees Romanov, it's because they've found Barnes, and Steve has called her in for back-up. Barnes is a mess, and Steve is a mess, and Sam is positive that someone's going to end up with a bullet in them before this is done. Then there's a click and a pop, and Barnes's expression goes from murderous to hilariously puzzled before he drops like a ragdoll to the ground. Romanov is standing behind him, holding an air pistol and looking supremely pleased with herself.

And that’s it. Just like that, it’s done. Mission accomplished.

Romanov calls in a favor, and within a few hours, an unmarked black helicopter drops neatly into the center of the little mountain town that set the scene for their final showdown. The grumpy-looking pilot doesn’t say a word, just follows Romanov’s orders and barely gives the rest of them more than a quick glance. Sam thinks that his life took a weird turn somewhere along the line.

As the green landscape rushes past below, Romanov turns around in her seat, dirt and ash streaked across her pale face, and gives him a warm smile. Sam decides he can deal with weird turns.

After that, things go back to... well, not normal. Sam left normal in the dust the moment he opened his door for Steve Rogers.

Steve takes Barnes to New York, thinking that a familiar setting might help shake some memories loose, and he tells Sam that he can handle it from there. Sam’s man enough to admit that he feels a little cast-off, but he can’t fault Steve for his priorities. Brainwashed, presumed-dead childhood best friends trump pretty much everything else. He gets it.

Romanov, of course, disappears in the way that only a master spy can, and Sam’s impressed despite the tiny ache in his stomach and the sense that something has ended, that it’s over before it ever started. He thinks about her smile and sighs and tries to go back to something like an ordinary life.

He really should know better.

Predictably, the text comes while he’s out for a run, and he doesn’t see it until nearly an hour later.

" _Meet me at Saint Louis, Sammy._ " 

He doesn’t even pause to take a shower before he’s out the door, hailing a cab and directing it to Michigan Park. It doesn’t occur to him that this might be a long shot until he’s halfway there, wracking his brain for other places she might have meant, wondering if it’s really her, if it’s a trap, if it means something. Then he clamors out of the cab, and there she is, lounging on a bench like a cat in the sunshine, her bright red curls tossing in the breeze.

Crossing the street toward her, he tries to think of what to say, how to greet a brilliant, gorgeous super spy-slash-hero who was part of the biggest adventure of his life and who he might have just a little bit of a crush on. She smiles as he walks up, and he says, “Don’t call me Sammy.”

Her smile widens. “Nice to see you, too.”

“Yeah, well, obviously it’s nice to see you,” he absolutely does not stammer. “How’s it going?”

“World keeps spinning,” she says, gesturing for him to sit beside her. “Heard you got your old job back. How’s that been?”

Sam’s first instinct is to say that it’s fine, but Romanov doesn’t ask questions if the answer is just _fine_. He thinks for a moment and tells her, “It feels different. Y’know, I got this backstage pass to pretty much saving the world, and after all of that and seeing... seeing what happened to Barnes, I guess I got reminded that somebody’s gotta be there for the people that do the saving.” He glances over to find her watching him with a thoughtful expression. “Does that make sense?”

She nods. “You did some of that saving, too.”

“I suppose I did,” he admits. “That what this is about? You checking up on my mental health?”

“In part.” She takes a folded piece of paper out of her pocket and hands it to him. “I also wanted to see if you might be interested in a change of scenery.”

The paper has a name and a grainy photo, neither of which are familiar to Sam. Below the basic information is a list of transgressions that includes treason, terrorism, human trafficking, and illegal experimentation. He gives Romanov a curious look, and she shrugs.

“Normally, I work alone, but I’ve learned the value of good back-up.” She takes the paper back and folds in neatly, slipping it back into her pocket before she speaks again. “You can say no. There are other people I can go to that I trust. Not many, but a few. You’re just my first choice.”

For a second, he thinks she must be lying, but she has no reason to. She really did come to him first, and he honestly can’t pin down the feeling he gets knowing he’s at the top of such a select list. There are a lot of things he should consider, a lot of questions he should ask, but the fact is that the Black Widow needs his help; everything else is details.

“Agent Romanov, it would be an honor,” he says, because there’s really nothing else he can say.

She grins, bumping her shoulder gently against his. “Call me Nat.”


End file.
